Bank Holidays & The Royal Wedding

This week we are giving you a combination of practical opening hours information and news of an exclusive Royal Wedding discount!

First of all, the simple details of when we will be opening over the next few bank holiday weekends;

Dates	Jesmond Shop	Benton Warehouse
Good Friday 22/04/11	Closed	Open 10am – 4pm
Saturday 23/04/11	Normal Hours (10am – 5pm)	Normal Hours (10am – 4pm)
Easter Sunday 24/04/11	Closed	Closed
Monday 25/04/11	Closed	Closed
Tuesday – Thursday 26/04/11 – 28/04/11	Normal Hours (10am – 5pm)	Normal Hours (10am -5pm)
Friday Royal Wedding 29/04/11	Closed	Closed
Saturday & Sunday 30/04/11 & 01/05/11	Normal Hours Saturday (10am – 5pm) Closed Sunday	Normal Hours Both Days (10am* – 4pm) *11am opening on Sunday

      Monday 02/05/11 - both the warehouse & shop will be closed

Next, for the exciting part; an exclusive preview of our Royal Wedding Weekend celebrations! Although we do not normally offer discounts or percentage savings, this most momentous occasion of a Royal Wedding calls for something extraordinary.

In celebration of the Royal Wedding on 29th April 2011, we are offering customers a 10%* discount either online or instore for the whole weekend (29th April - 2nd May).

The offer code is: 'royalwedding11' 

This code will be valid to use on our website on friday 29th April whilst we are closed (having our own raucous celebrations) and then all weekend in our shop and warehouse. All you have to do to take part, is either use the above discount code when progressing through the checkout of our website, or, alternatively, print this page and bring it with you to either our shop or warehouse.

CLICK TO VISIT WEBSITE NOW

*10% Discount valid on retail price for items up to the value of £2000 and only one use of the discount per customer. Please note that payment must be made at time of purchase to benefit from this discount.

Enjoy your royal wedding celebrations and don't miss out on this offer - we don't do these often, infact this is our first discount event in our 11 year history! Here's some inspiration incase you're so overwhelmed by our generosity that you don't know which room of your home to furnish with antiques first!...

 Mousey Thompson Oak Table

 George IV Mahogany Elbow Chair

Set of ten mid 19th century pan top wine glasses

This blog is brought to you by Graham Smith Antiques Ltd. For more information about our products and daily updates about antiques, follow us on twitter or visit our website www.grahamsmithantiques.com

How to Clean Antique Furniture

A question that we're asked again and again, is how to clean up antique furniture - especially really dirty neglected items that have not been used for years or stuck in a garage.

This weeks blog will aim to explain not only how to clean antique furniture but what to use and how often to do it. We're going to presume the furniture you need to clean is really dirty and dry but this technique can be used less frequently for well kept furniture too, so it stays in prime condition!

Step One

Using a clean duster or rag (which does not have loose fibres that may catch on veneers etc) dust down the item of furniture you wish to clean.

Fill a bowl with warm water and a drop or two of vinegar. Soak a good quality furniture cloth such as the one pictured below in the mixture and then ring out until almost dry.

Step Two
Using your soaked and rung out furniture cloth, wipe down the item of antique furniture until it is clean. Dark nicotine coloured residue may come off on the cloth, this is normal for a piece of furniture that has not been cleaned for a long time (or has been in a house with smokers in which case it will have more of this coloured residue).

Keep soaking and ringing out your cloth inbetween wiping down the item and continue until you are happy that it is clean. Remember that antique furniture builds up a patina on the surface, which develops over many years so don't try to scrub it down, use gentle strokes and only clean until the residue on the cloth lightens sufficiently.

Leave your item of furniture for 24 hours to dry completely (don't be tempted to rush with the polish as you will be locking the damp and moisture in the wood, which is not a good result!)

Step Three
Dust the furniture lightly with a clean rag or furniture cloth. Then, using a good quality Beeswax furniture polish (such as the one pictured below) rub plenty of wax into the furniture in small circular motions with a clean dry furniture cloth.

These traditional beeswax polishes are used on our own furniture and keep our stock looking sparkling. It's best to steer away from spray polishes as they leave a sticky residue on furniture and many even state on the can 'not to be used on french polished furniture' which many antiques are.

We sell the beeswax polish above on our website, in our shop, in the warehouse and even on our ebay shop. It has become so popular with international customers that we ship jars all over the world every week, whcih initially amazed us, but it really is the best stuff to use even if it does have to travel accross the world!

CLICK HERE TO BUY BEESWAX POLISH

Step Four
Once you've rubbed plenty of beeswax polish into the furniture, leave it for at least two hours to soak into the wood. Then, using a clean dry cloth (combined with some serious elbow grease) buff the furniture until the shine returns and the colour starts to develop in the grain again.

Although this process only needs doing when furniture is very dirty, using beeswax polish and following step three onwards can be repeated every few months to keep your antiques in the best condition. We belive it's worth investing time and effort keeping furniture clean and nourished, not only does it preserve them, it keeps furniture looking good and is much more hygenic - you wouldn't neglect to wipe your kitchen benches for six months or even years at a time would you?!

Hopefullly this post will have been useful for you, if it has, why not follow our blog or for regular snippets follow our TWITTER updates?
This useful information has been brought to you by Graham Smith Antiques Ltd

Object of the Year 2011

After reaching the final last year, we have entered another wonderful item for this years "Object of the Year" competition!

LAPADA (the antique dealers association) have run a competition for the past few years for 'Object of the Year' in partnership with Country Life Magazine. We reached the final in 2010 with our Victorian Framed Wax Mirror (pictured below), which has now been added to our general stock following it's retirement from international competition! This year, we have a really special item entered, discovered in the wilds of Scotland during one of Graham's regular buying adventures.

A very unusual Victorian oval dressing mirror

The 2011 entry is an 18th Century Battersea Enamelled casket, which is rare for two key reasons. First of all any Battersea enamel is a rare find as the factory was not open for very long, so not many pieces were originally produced. The Victoria and Albert museum commentary on Battersea Enamel  says "This factory, though very short-lived, produced some of the finest as well as earliest of all English transfer-printed enamels". The second reason our casket is so rare is that is of unusually large dimensions. Even the V & A's collection of Battersea Enamel does not include a casket of this size, they mainly have plaques and plates, so this gives you some idea of how rare this item could be!

The casket has wonderful landscape scenes transfer printed to the four bow sides and the dome lid, each panel is held within a gilt metal frame. The lid hinges open to an interior that has been lined with red velvet - this is not original.

To the underside of the base is part of an old label that is difficult to read, "From Coll. M.H.H. Princess . . . . . . . ouki". The box does have some very minor cracks to the edge. (Circa 1760) 

We hope you've enjoyed learning about Battersea enamel and the Object of the Year competition. To receive regular updates about what's happening at Graham Smith Antiques, join out Facebook page or follow us on Twitter